Evolution, the Purpose of Life and the Order of Society

This essay treats the pseudo-biographical monographs with which the Turkish author Halit Ertuğrul popularizes the teachings of Said Nursi, founder of the Nurcu movement. Rejection of the theory of evolution plays a central role in these narratives, where a religious person acts as a prompter who demonstrates to a person led astray by materialism the futility of his ideology. As soon as ‘the materialists’ have understood this, they change their life entirely and free themselves from the sociopolitical delusions of communism or behavioral problems. The theory of evolution functions in these accounts not only as a basis of atheism and materialism but also as the antithesis of a harmonious order of the cosmos, which ought to be reflected in a harmonious order of society. This paper is one of a collection that originated in the IAHR Special Conference “Religions, Science and Technology in Cultural Contexts:  Dynamics of Change”, held at The Norwegian University of Science and Technology on March 1–2, 2012. For an overall introduction see the article by Ulrika Mårtensson, also published here. &nbsp

« L’islam a débuté étranger et étranger il redeviendra » : Muḫtaṣar sīrat ar-rasūl de Muḥammad ʿAbd al-Wahhāb en tant que programme et propagande

Parmi les œuvres de Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Wahhāb, on trouve une biographie du Prophète intitulée Résumé de la vie du Prophète (Muḫtaṣar sīrat ar-rasūl). Seuls deux islamologues occidentaux se sont jusqu’à présent confrontés à cet ouvrage, bien qu’il soit bien connu que le fondateur du wahhabisme eût pris grand soin de modeler son activité sur la vie de Muḥammad. Chase Robinson fait remarquer dans une courte note d’Islamic Historiography la structure inhabituelle de l’ouvrage ; Shahab Ahmed, dan..

Propagating Islamic Creationism on the Internet

Although negative reactions accompanied the reception of Darwinism in the Islamic World from the beginning, a full fledged Islamic creationist movement did notappear before the 1970s. Originally it was restricted to Turkey, where Islamic groups attempted to undermine the materialist foundation of Marxism and Kemalism. From the late 1990s onwards the subject became popular among Muslims inthe diaspora. This was due to the efforts of Adnan Oktar alias Harun Yahya, ahitherto marginal figure in Turkey, to propagate his ideas via the Internet. The Internet allows him to adapt his propaganda constantly to new issues and creationistand anti-creationist publications and to recruit volunteers willing to translate hisbooks. Thanks to the combination of a neglected subject with the innovative use ofnew media Oktar gained the opinion leadership in this field. Even movements, the founders of which had attacked Darwinism, now refer to Oktar as main authorityon this issue. However, he failed to gain an equal degree of attention for topics like conspiracy theories and eschatology. In these fields he had to compete with a bulk ofexisting material in conventional media. The success of his former disciple Mustafa Akyol shows that using the Internet as main means of propaganda may restrict thepolitical impact. He became the chief Muslim ally of Christian creationists in the USA by managing to get published by respectable “old media”. For him the Internet only fulfils an auxiliary function

Al-Shāṭibīs sufismekritik: Hvorfor en ʿālim fra al-Andalus forkastede askese og virtuosereligiositet

The faqīh (Islamic legal scholar) al-Shāṭibī (d. 1388) from Granada is primarily known for his innovative approach within the field of legal theory (uṣūl al-fiqh). However, he dedicated much attention to the criticism of sufism. But like other Islamic scholars who opposed Sufism he did not primarily attack infringements on the ‘rights of God’. Instead he highlighted that the ascetic practices propagated by the Sufis are detrimental to the welfare of both the individual Muslim and society as a whole. Furthermore he argues that their charismatic authority based on their asceticism and miracles allegedly bestowed on them threatens to undermine Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) along rational and intersubjective lines

Islam og Coronakrisen

Islam og Coronakrise

Globale reaktioner på COVID-19 – religion og trossamfund i en krisetid

Globale reaktioner på COVID-19 – religion og trossamfund i en kriseti

Gammelt had eller nutidskonflikter? Et moyenne durée-perspektiv på aktuelle sekteriske konflikter

Som det ofte er blevet påpeget, har forklaringer på de nuværende sekteriske konflikter i Mellemøsten været præget af to forskellige tilgange, den instrumentalistiske og den primordialistiske. Det primordialistiske fokus på religion giver emiske forklaringer af sekteriske konflikter baseret på doktrinære og rituelle forskelle, men først og fremmest spørgsmålet om Muhammads legitime efterfølgere. Som konsekvens er slaget ved Kerbela blevet betragtet som den afgørende begivenhed i islamisk historie, der kan forklare de nuværende konflikter. Instrumentalistiske analyser indskrænker deres fokus til kendsgerninger i en ramme af få år, eller få årtier. For at overvinde modsætningen mellem disse to positioner retter denne artikel fokus på et mellemliggende tidsniveau, som indtil videre ikke har været begrebsliggjort og derfor ikke har været et centralt emne i debatten om sekterisme. Udgangspunktet er den franske økonomihistoriker Fernand Braudels opdeling af historiske processer i tre forskellige tidsperioder: longue durée (langvarige udviklinger, som skaber grundlæggende strukurer), conjoncture/moyenne durée (mellemlange udviklinger) og évenements (kortvarige processer, som fører til enkelte begivenheder). Artiklen her fokuserer på moyenne durée som forklaringsramme for de nuværende sekteriske konflikter i Irak, Syrien og Bahrain.It is often argued that analyses of contemporary Sunni-Shia conflicts are based on either instrumentalist or primordialist approaches. With their focus on religion primordialists tend to accept emic explanations of sectarian conflicts on the basis of different creeds and practices and above all the dispute over the question of Muh .ammad’s legitimate succession. As a consequence the battle at Karbala appears as the decisive event in Islamic history that provides a clue to recent conflicts. As opposed to that, instrumentalist analyses restrict the temporal frame of their inquiry to only a few years or at best decades. In order to overcome this dilemma, the present article focusses on a time level in between, which up to now has not been conceptualized in debates on sectarianism. The starting point is the division of three time levels of historical processes formulated by Fernand Braudels. These are: longue durée (long term developments creating structures), conjoncture/ moyenne durée (mid-term developments), and évenements (short term processes leading to the single events). This article uses moyenne durée as explanatory framework for the current sectarian conflicts in Iraq, Syria and Bahrain

Damian Howard. Being Human in Islam: The impact of the evolutionary worldview. London & New York: Routledge. 2011.

Book review

Islamic Responses to the COVID-19 pandemic in India and Pakistan

India’s and Pakistan’s governments, like most of the world’s governments, responded to the spread of the COVID-19 virus with lockdowns, which in principle also affected religious institutions and rituals. However, Sunni mosques in Pakistan were not closed, as the government has no authority over autonomous religious organizations. In contrast, the Islamic organizations and institutions in India complied with government orders, and tried to present themselves as a “responsible minority” during a period when relations with the Hindu nationalist government were strained, and because a convention of the Tablīghī Jamāʿat had contributed considerably to the spread of the disease in the country and abroad. In Pakistan, the role of the “responsible minority” was played by the Shiites, who closed their mosques. On the whole, Muslim religious leaders and organizations showed little interest in taking a stand on the pandemic. Those few who make extensive use of the internet tend to address the better-educated social strata, and tend view pandemic-related restrictions more favorably